Tonight's red post collection includes Meddler with an update on the previously discussed early game changes for turrets and cannon minions, a big roundup of Kled discussion, live LCU alpha updates, context on the SKT skins returning to the PBE, and more!

Over the last few days we've been gathering feedback from a number of pro players, coaches and analysts from multiple regions. One of the big reoccurring comments was that the collateral damage from the cannon minion change was much higher than we were accounting for. General feeling was that while it would make it more costly to lane swap (desired), it would also disrupt a lot of other play, strategic movement especially, later on in the game in the 5 to 20 minute period (undesired). Based off that concern, some follow up playtesting and some strong arguments that the other changes would already add significant cost to lane swapping, we've decided to remove the cannon minion change. We believe that we need to make changes to encourage more early game interaction, the cannon minion change looks like a case of too high a price for that though, at least at this time of year.

Some good questions were also raised about the tower AI changes currently scheduled for a later patch. We haven't got those into playtesting yet, but will be investigating those issues as soon as we can, particularly around their effects on early risk taking. It's possible we might end up delaying some of those AI changes to Pre-Season. We believe they'll be good for the game once tuned appropriately, might or might not be the right time for them though. We'll assess whether or not they make sense once we've seen what the impact of 6.15 is like and once we've been able to get some feedback on them direct in game, PBE included.

We also particularly want to get feedback from a number of pro teams that we haven't spoken with, especially given there are some regions we haven't yet been able to get more organized feedback from. While we aren't planning any other major systemic changes before pre-season we will tweak existing numbers if appropriate in patches 6.16-6.18 (thinks like Fortification duration, amount of gold for first tower kill etc). Ongoing feedback's going to be especially valuable there.

TLDR:
No cannon minion changes
Might delay some of the tower AI changes"

Following the initial post, Meddler hung around the thread answering various questions:

Meddler confirmed the cannon changes aren't going out in 6.15 despite initially being mentioned in the notes:

"Quote:

Does this mean cannon minion changes are not making it live tomorrow?They are still listed in the official 6.15 patch notes.

I still do believe the extra call for help for the turret AI should be added. This is a mechanic that should have a existed a long time ago. The way turrets fuction right now it's very counter-intuitive. I'm sitting right next to my turret, an enemy right under it is attacking me, but my turret isn't protecting me because I'm just a few steps outside it's range. How does that even make sense...

We'll almost certainly add that change. The only question is whether we do so pre Worlds or just post Worlds."

Just because I'm curious I'd like to hear specifically what makes the cannon change disruptive

High expected impact on map rotations, including risk of forcing specific rotation patterns versus allowing more adaptive play. Possible the changes might work out fine after a number of months of play, so maybe we'll explore them again for a pre-season or something. Wrong time for them though at present at least."

What in particular was it about the cannon minion change that would affect pro play? Were pros rotating their primary carries lane to lane just to pick up cannon minions?

Pushing power was the bigger concern than gold income. Cannons make an enormous difference in ability to take down towers, given they both take hits before other squishier minions and take reduced damage from towers."

He continued, replying to a question on making Kled able to gain courage on jungle camps:

"It's possible we might change how he gets courage in the future, but for now I don't want him to feel like he should leave-" "fights to go farm jungle to remount. fights to go farm jungle to remount."

"It's pretty standard practice these days to mix in a bit of %hp damage with most fighter champs. This helps them to have a slightly more similar TTK on tanks, fighters, and other squishies. If we gave them all flat damage, they would often end up just blowing up squishies at unreasonable speeds (see rengar)."

Could you explain why it has become standard practice? Is there a reason tanks have to die equally regardless of how well or poorly an enemy is doing?

Not speaking to Kled here, but as an overall comment on "% health damage on fighters."

In the past I have tended to use % health damage as less of a "I kill tanks" stat and more of "I don't one-shot sqiushies" stat.

That probably sounds weird, but hear me out here:

Say your champion, Talon, is only good at killing Ashe and nothing else. That guy better bereally good at killing Ashe, else he's going to be useless. Given how safe Ashe tends to be (especially when she has a Janna on her team) it's likely Talon is going to need some mechanics that result in him one-shotting her before she can respond.

Talon is viable, but Ashe has a bad time.

Now imagine that Talon had mechanics in his kit that allowed him to have some degree of success vs. champions who aren't Ashe. In this case Talon can be less good at killing Ashe because he can contribute to the team in other ways. Wooo, Joe's success case is now less binary and Ashe doesn't get one-shot as much.

% health damage is one such mechanic. It can allow a character who might normally be very focused on murdering squishies to have success cases against tanks, which means we can make their overall effectiveness against said squishies lower and possibly less frustrating.

Of course there's tradeoffs here. % health damage isn't always a good idea or the right thing to do, given the champion we're putting it on. Gains in one area often come with costs in another. Tank Ekko and Fizz showed us the dark side of more target agnostic assassins for example.

Side note: Tanks can still respond to % health damage by buliding Armor/MR. That means a tank doing well is still going to outpace a %health char doing poorly (assuming the right tuning). This is why %health true damage has always been so contentious."

"Been waiting for this for awhile ;) The problem with how these lines are presented to you on youtube is that all files are just lined up in alphabetical order and then rendered out - doing this doesn't always give you the best representation of what Kled sounds like in game.

Kled has VO kits for being On Skaarl and Off Skaarl. Skaarl also will speak to Kled and Kled to Skaarl while mounted. When Kled is off Skaarl he's much more aggressive and yells...alot. We really wanted a shift in character when he becomes dismounted - but that's tough to get across when the voice files are presented like this.

Kled also has a bunch of Kill Champion lines - he has call outs for maybe 15 or so individual champs and then a large bucket for killing any champ. We started doing this with Jhin and we're starting to think that Kill Champ lines have more value then Interactive Taunts or Buy Item lines. Curious to hear what you guys think.

I can't wait for everyone to hear it in game!

edit: This voice actor also voiced another champion years ago - extra bonus points if you can guess who it is"

[LCU Alpha] Alpha client patch .06 changelog

It's time for Twisted Treeline. We’ve given you a sneak peek of the changes heading your way with this patch, so now we need you to give it a go and leave your feedback.

As you battle it out 3v3, please take any surveys that pop up, and submit your feedback and bug reports anytime via the alpha homepage in the client. If you're in the mood, drop by the alpha discussion board to chat with your fellow testers and the client dev team. Your feedback will help inform where we iterate before we launch the updated client!

We’ll be back in a bit to talk about normal draft and ranked. If you haven’t yet signed up for the alpha, sign up now to get in on the action as soon as possible—we’ll be sending another wave of invites in the upcoming weeks. "

SKT skins return to PBE in 6.16 cycle

As you may have noticed, the previously delayed SKT 2015 World Champion skins are back in the PBE in the 6.16 cycle - complete with upgrades, unique recalls, and the addition of Azir and Kalista!

Here's SuperCakes with context thread on the new and improved SKT T1 Skins set!

"Hey everyone!

As our SKT T1 World Championship skins hit PBE, I wanted to circle back and chat about the changes we’ve made.

Before I get into the details, I want to thank you again for helping us see how much better these skins could be. We took a little extra time to really focus in on what would make these skins feel special, and we think it’s totally worth it.

The teams combed through all of the player feedback, but also used this as an opportunity to work with SKT T1 to make the skins commemorate the pros themselves. Here’s what we ended up with:

Outfit changes

VFX updates and recall animations added

Added Azir and replaced Sivir with Kalista

2015 SKT T1 uniform colors

We changed the outfits on all of the skins to reflect SKT T1’s 2015 uniform. We considered using the color scheme from their World Championship uniforms, but since those were primarily black, we chose to go in a direction that would make for a visually compelling skin while also celebrating their 2015 colors.

Added some bells and whistles

It was hard to choose which skins to do VFX and Recall Animations for, so we didn’t choose! Each skin has some amount of particle updates to commemorate the team as well as a new recall animation.

Speaking of recall animations…

We love making recall animations for our skins and this time was extra special. We reached out to each of the pros and asked them to help us design a recall that would celebrate them!

Azir… you weren’t so Easy…

See what I did there? Let’s be honest, Azir is a pretty complex champion. This one was never going to be as easy as an outfit, a few particles, and a recall. When you make a skin for Azir, you have to go all in. We’re really excited about how this one turned out. We hope you (and Easyhoon) are too!

Oh, hey there Kalista!

At the time we decided to re-work the skins, we weren’t sure if we’d be able to get Kalista done. She had a different skin in production at the time and this meant adding a completely new skin (in addition to Azir) at a time we hadn’t planned for one (let alone two). But after listening to all of you (and Bang) we knew we had an opportunity to really get this right. So, we added the Kalista skin and we hope you’re as happy as we are with it!

Making a splash!

A lot of players were disappointed they never got to see the splash for the original set. We were too! Using a combination of talent and wizardry, our splash artist was able to take the original splash and make it that much better! What do you think?

So, that’s pretty much it. Take the skins for a spin on PBE and let us know what you think.

After this year’s Worlds, we’ll be bringing the winning team out to Riot HQ to work directly with the team on designing the next set. Who do you hope will get some Worlds skins next year?

Patch 6.15 - The One Where The Towers Change

I’m Gentleman Gustaf, and here with me is Riot’s Playtest Team, a group of high-ranking League players whose job it is to play the hell out of things and give actionable objective feedback to designers. Think of us as your high-Elo friends who happen to have played the new patch, rework, or champion long before it ever came out.

Every two weeks (concurrent with the release of patch notes, we’re going to be hosting a discussion here on Dev Corner. Take this opportunity to ask us any questions about how we feel about the game or what it’s like to work as a Riot playtester.

Several of our playtesters have competitive experience with lane swaps, so if you want to know how we think they will affect lane swaps - or just regular play - leave your questions below!

In competitive play, we expect to see fewer fast-push lane swaps. Specifically, we expect that lane swaps will now at least be contested, thanks to the value of tower first blood and the weaker bot side towers. This may change after the first five minutes of the game, but by then champions have their full basic kits (no ultimates yet) and can take better advantage of the mechanical aspects of the game in additional to the tactical.

In solo queue, we think that champions who can poke towers early on (Caitlyn?) might have the option of taking towers somewhat earlier, but that it probably won’t have much of an impact.

We will be around for the next few hours and will try to answer as many questions as possible.